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Wally breathed in and out, softly, centering himself on the task at hand. His hands were shaking and his knees felt weak (something all those stairs certainly didn't help with) and it was all he could do not to turn around and walk away.
No. He let his hand come to rest on the poké balls on his belt. They'd come this far together. One way or another, they'd see it out until the end.
“Okay,” Wally said, to himself or to his pokémon, and smiled. “I'm ready.”
The great stone doors swung open before him as if they'd heard his words, shuddering and groaning under the weight of their own enormous mass.
Wally nodded.
The room within was strikingly bare. There were none of the lingering spirits or gouts of fire or shifting sand that had marked its predecessors. Just an octagon of dust-colored tile suspended in a seemingly endless void, marked only by the door behind him and the one ahead of him.
And, standing between those two doors, the champion of the Hoenn League.
She was facing away from him, looking up at the doors to the Hall of Fame, but as he stepped forward she began to speak. “You've done well to get this far, trainer. But there's still one more challenge you have to face.” With that, she turned on her heels—and broke into a massive smile. “Wally?”
“Ah,” Wally said, suddenly overwhelmed by the force of her grin. “Hello.” He'd considered telling her he'd be trying, but there was no guarantee he'd make it past even the first Elite Four member and he hadn't wanted to disappoint her by not showing up.
(And, under that, he was worried she might by angry with him. This was her position she was trying to take, after all.)
May laughed out loud as she ran towards him. Before he could even react, she had her hands wrapped around his. She grinned down at him with all the brightness of the sun. “I was wondering where you'd been! You haven't showed up to the Battle Maison these past few weeks, I was starting to get worried. I can't believe you finally decided to go for a challenge!”
Wally's face went tomate-berry-red. “You noticed?” Being champion was such a busy job; he hadn't expected her to keep track of one fellow trainer's presence, no matter how long they'd known each other.
May puffed her cheeks out and frowned. “Of course I noticed. You're my favorite multi battle partner—do you know how boring team matches are when you're not there?”
If his cheeks were any hotter, he might actually start spitting fire. “That's…” He swallowed. “Thank you. I like battling with you too.”
There was a long pause, both of them standing there and not saying much of anything at all, before May abruptly seemed to realize she was still holding Wally's hands. She jumped backwards. “Ah, sorry about that! I just got a little over-excited. Sydney told me there was a challenger coming but nobody would let me know who it was… I was getting so curious I just couldn't stand it.” She laughed. “I almost went to wait for you on the stairs!”
He was very glad she hadn't done that. The sight of him huffing and puffing as he ascended the massive staircase, stopping every twenty steps to catch his breath… it wouldn't have made for a very imposing first impression.
Not, he suspected, that it would matter much to May. She'd known him longer than anyone; she'd seen the way he'd shivered and shook when he was catching his first pokémon. If she wanted to look down him, she'd had plenty of opportunities before now.
“Well,” he said, standing up straighter, “I'm here now, right? And I'm ready to challenge the Elite Four's champion.”
Not that ready: nearly all his team was exhausted by the battles that had come before. Three of of them had fainted already, and he'd run out of revives after facing Glacia. The only pokémon still in prime fighting shape was his gallade.
He didn't think he could win; not this time around, at least. But—he wrapped a hand around the pokémon on his belt, taking comfort in the cool smoothness of their spheres—he wasn't afraid of losing. Not anymore. He'd fight May head-on and not back down.
May stared into his eyes for a moment before nodding. Her earlier cheer was gone, replaced by a cool sort of determination. It wasn't rude, just… professional. This was the face she showed every challenger to the throne, he realized, and she wasn't about to treat him any differently.
Wally appreciated that.
“Well then,” she said, “how about we start over?”
A few sprinting steps put her back at the other end of the field, back in front of the doors to the Hall of the Fame. “As I was saying, challenger, there's still one more challenge you have to face. As the champion of the Elite Four, I've honed my skills in battle and my connection with my team by facing down some of the most powerful trainers in the world. If you take that step into the ring, I won't show you any mercy. Are you ready for the battle ahead of you?”
Her voice rang out into the emptiness around them, echoing against the faraway walls. Here, with a poké ball in her hand and the battle arena stretching out all around her, she looked more like a goddess than a human being. Wally could hardly remember the little girl with the mudkip he'd once known.
He breathed in, closed his eyes, pressed his hands against his pendant for one more burst of courage. When he opened them again, he was calm. “I'm ready.”
May's answering smile was bright and fierce. “Wonderful. Then we begin now. Let's go, Crevice!”
Light spilled from the blue-and-white sphere she threw into the air. Wally didn't even have to look to know which pokémon would be emerging from it: he knew that nickname, remembered when the beast it referred to had been nothing more than a geodude.
“Rose,” he said, throwing his answer into the arena, “let's do this!”
His roserade staggered as she burst from the ball, bruised already from the battles before. Crystals of frost clung to her petals and the white rippling ones on the crown of her head were singed. Still, she smiled at him when she touched down on the battlefield's floor and matched the golem's roar with a battle shriek of her own.
Wally couldn't help the proud smile that stretched its way across his face. He truly had a wonderful team. “Start it off with leech seed!”
“Rollout!” May countered instantly. “Get away from her!”
May's golem tucked into his rocky shell, but before he could escape Rose waved her arm and tossed a handful of seeds towards Crevice's massive form. Green vines burst upwards where they landed, digging into the cracks in the pokémon's armor.
The golem tore from his shell with a snarl, snapping and clawing at the vines engulfing him, but his limbs weren't long enough to rip away the seeds. There was always another vine growing to replace the ones he tore away; each creeping sprout meant another bit of energy siphoned to Rose.
Wally smiled. Let May's pokémon struggle—the more he did, the more energy the plants stole. At this rate, Rose would back in full fighting shape in only a few moments.
“Crevice!” May called. Her voice carried an immense weight; even Rose stopped in place for a moment at the sound of it. “Rollout. You can do it, okay?”
The golem paused for a moment, clearly panicked by the growths surrounding it, then growled out a response. Before either trainer or pokémon could react, Crevice's head and arms retracted back into his shell. His short, stubby legs gave him the first push he needed, and before long the great earthen mass was moving.
Vines snapped as he picked up speed. Rose's seeds kept sprouting more and more, trying to cover his body again, but the golem was twisting and shaking too fast for them to latch on.
“Rose, shadow ball!” Wally called desperately. If he could just get a solid hit in—
It was too late. With a violent snap, the pokémon broke free of the last of the vines and went careening through the arena. Rose's shadow ball flew uselessly past where he once had been tied down and collided with some far-off wall.
My fault, Wally thought. If he'd just moved in for the blow instead of hanging back and waiting… He'd assumed a champion wouldn't have a strategy to counter his, as if a type advantage was all he'd need to defeat someone like May. How short-sighted can I get?
No time to think on it now. The golem's path was curving, arcing towards Rose. A direct hit on his roserade's frail body would knock her out without question.
Rose tensed to dodge, only to stop when Wally made a frantic hand motion. “Wait,” he said quietly. “Wait, wait…”
The golem grew closer and closer, picking up speed with every revolution he turned.
“Now!” he shouted. “Petal blizzard!”
A cloud of petals as sharp as knives exploded from Rose's bouquets. They whirled about her like a hurricane, twisting and slicing at anything within their path. May threw a hand across her face to shield against the slivers. Wally squinted into the cloud, desperately trying to make out anything within.
If he'd chosen the wrong move, if he'd given the command a moment too late… Come on, Rose.
Finally, the unnatural wind died down. The multicolored petals began to float lazily to the ground.
Rose stood at the head of the unconscious golem, her bouquets raised high in the air, panting and wide-eyed but unmistakably triumphant.
“Good job!” Wally pressed his hands against his face, overwhelmed by pride and excitement. “Rose, you did it!”
She smiled at him and gave a soft, cheery cry.
“Not bad at all,” May said. Her face was alight with something fierce; just looking at it left Wally shivering with excitement and nerves alike. “I didn't think you'd be willing to face that head on. You've gotten very brave, Rose.” This she directed to his roserade, who chirped with pleasure and hid behind her bouquets for a moment before remembering that May was supposed to be her opponent. “Come on back, Crevice.”
The golem returned to her hand in a flash of red light. “I won't go so easy on you this time. Get ready, Dusty!”
“Rose, come on back,” Wally said immediately. She murmured a complaint at him, but returned to his outstretched poké ball willingly enough. He wanted to save her for when—if—May's swampert came out, and there was no chance at that if she faced off against this opponent.
May's camerupt blew a plume of smoke at him from across the field. The beast's half-lidded eyes looked unfocused and lazy, but Wally knew the ferocity (and the heat) that he could summon when roused. His azumarill would have been his first choice to face this pokémon, talonflame his second… but both of them were unconscious already.
Third choice would have to be the charm, then. Wally plucked a poké ball from his belt and tossed it lightly into the air. “You ready, Star?”
His garchomp landed on all fours before pushing herself back to her feet. Like Rose, she was battered—she'd taken a few unlucky hits against Drake's opposing dragons—but she was nothing if not determined. Her mouth curved into a toothy grin as she met the camerupt's gaze.
Wally set his sights on the opponent, mind racing as the two of them sized each other up. He had the type advantage once again—the benefit of being the challenger—and his garchomp's earthquake was a sight to behold. If she could get just one or two solid attacks off this fight could be theirs. All he had to do—
“Dusty, turn up the heat!”
Wally and Star both yelped as a blume of ash-black smoke poured from camerupt's back. The temperature in the room shot upward immediately: Wally's coat stuck to his back with sudden sweat and the air felt almost too dry to breathe.
He knew this attack, knew what came next, but all he could think to do was escape. “Star, dodge it!” he shrieked.
A plume of ash and lava erupted from the twin volcanoes on Dusty's back, sending white-hot sparks into the air. The molten rock pooled over the peaks of the camerupt's humps, spilled past the trio of circles on his flank and quickly began to spread across the battlefield.
Star leaped upwards, clutching the wall above Wally's head to avoid the boiling heat oozing across the arena. She was safe—for now—and she had a platform of sorts to attack from, but there was no way she could unleash an earthquake when the ground itself was painful for her to touch. With just one move, May had taken out almost all of his advantage.
No wonder she'd become the champion. Even as he worried, Wally couldn't help but be impressed.
Okay. New strategy. In a way, Star was the best possible pokémon to have out in this situation. Her short-range attacks were crushingly powerful, and those fins of hers could keep her in the air for a good time.
They'd have to be bold about it. They'd only get one shot at it. But it could work.
May stood stock-still at the other end of the arena, her camerupt an immovable force at her front. She smiled at him when he glanced her way.
“So,” May asked, “what next?”
It was his move, Wally realized. May already controlled nearly all the field. She could take no advantage from trying to press them further, not without risking her position.
All right, Wally thought. He could do this. They could do this.
He gestured sharply up towards Star. She twisted around to face him, claws still holding firm to the seams between the stone tiles. “Graaa?”
“On my signal,” he said quietly, “fly in as close as you can get.”
Her tail beat eagerly against the wall as she listened to his command.
A moment's wait, then another. Let May think he was growing anxious, that he was going to choke up and back off. Then—
“Now!” Wally shouted and garchomp sprung from the wall with a shriek.
Her wings and her fins guided her towards camerupt with laser-exact precision; she bore down on him with all the force and fury of a dragon. Her jaws opened wide, her claws gleaming… it was no wonder that May herself stepped back in alarm at the sight of her.
“Brace for it!”
“Dragon claw!”
May's camerupt took the first attack with his head down and his feet planted. Star's energy-laced claws glanced off the rough hide of his humps, and she nearly overbalanced and pitched onto the burning ground when he shook her roughly.
“Hold on!” Wally called out. “Use crunch!”
This time, his garchomp's attack struck true. Her needle-sharp teeth sunk into the fur and fat just below the primary volcano, and she clung on for dear life as Dusty bucked and reared.
This was it, Wally realized with growing excitement. There was nothing May's camerupt could do to Star from here: another eruption wouldn't have anywhere near the power of the first, and he had neither the strength to buck her off nor the means to pull her away. Just a few more attacks would make this rounds theirs.
“Dragon cl—” he started again, only to be cut off by May's roaring voice.
“Take her down, Dusty!” she yelled.
For a moment, Wally didn't understood what that meant—it had to be meaningless encouragement or a desperate plea towards a helpless pokémon. But her camerupt understood immediately; without even a moment's hesitation, he launched himself forward in a mad stampede towards the wall nearest Wally. The camerupt trod over white-hot rock and lava alike completely unbothered, his dazed and sleepy eyes fixed only on his target.
Far too late, he realized what May was planning. His garchomp was wrapped around Dusty's front, completely at the mercy of anything they hit.
“Get free!” he yelled to Star, but there was no time. She had just enough warning to bunch her muscles for an escape before May's camerupt slammed her bodily into the wall.
She shrieked—a high, piercing sound—then went limp. Her jaw relaxed its death grip on Dusty's fur.
“I yield,” Wally said quickly, before she could fall onto the burning ground. “This round is yours.” He recalled his unconscious garchomp with a twist of shame; he'd thought their plan was perfect. He hadn't so much as considered that method of attack.
“Not quite,” May said gently as she pulled out her own. “You did better than you're giving yourself credit for.”
“Huh?” Wally followed May's gaze to see her camerupt swaying on his feet. His normally-sleepy expression now looked practically comatose.
“Come on back, Dusty.” She smiled fondly as the light swirled around him, calling him back within. “You did great.”
Oh, he realized, of course. Take down was a double-edged sword; it was as likely to harm the pokémon using it as the one being targeted. A blind charge like could only be more dangerous still, and it looked like Dusty had taken his fair share of damage with the hit.
That meant… Wally swallowed. That meant he was up one still. Two down on May's side to only one on his. A bright spark of hope settled in his chest, every bit as hot as the still-burning embers around them.
“Well, then.” May's voice sounded light and cheerful, but her stance was everything but. She looked completely intent on the battle before her—one hand was on her belt and the other clenched tightly at her side. A stray ember had singed her bandanna, leaving a spot of ashen gray against its normal bright red. “Let's get serious with this.”
This time, Wally knew what pokémon she'd be sending out before she even said the name. There could be only one teammate she called upon with a challenge like that.
Her swampert crashed to the ground in front of her with a tile-rattling roar. The massive pokémon was glancing around the field of battle before the last of her had even formed out of the poké ball's light, her eyes darting this way and that in search of enemies. She paused for a moment when she saw Wally, orange eyes squinting at him from across the arena, and then she turned and made a curious noise at May.
It was all Wally could do not to wave at her across the battlefield. He knew that she was strongest of May's pokémon, the biggest hurdle he faced in his quest for the title of champion… but some part of him still remembered Lily as the little mudkip that trotted by her trainer's heels as May led Wally out of town to catch his first pokémon.
“I know, right?” May said in response. “It surprised me too. He's beating us right now, so don't let your guard down.”
That, apparently, was all the encouragement the swampert needed. She turned back towards Wally and roared another, louder challenge at him. This time even the distant walls seemed to tremble with the force of it.
“She says she's not going to easy on you,” May added helpfully.
“Well, good. I wouldn't want her to.” He tossed his poké ball at a cooler patch on the floor. “One more time, Rose!”
When she appeared, the first thing Rose did was yelp and throw an accusing glare Wally's way. The field had begun to cool down the moment Dusty was recalled, but it was still uncomfortably hot—a grass-type especially had to find it unpleasant.
“It's not my fault! I promise!” he protested, holding his hands up. His talonflame set the room on fire one time and she never let him forget it.
She wasn't going to last long—not with her injuries, and especially not with this heat. All the same, she had some powerful poison attacks at her disposal; a little venom in Lily's veins might be just what he needed to turn the battle in their favor.
“He's right,” May said from the other end of the field, “this one's on us. Don't worry, we can fix it.” Wally had just enough time to think oh no, to feel the bottom drop out of his stomach, before May called out, “blizzard!”
The temperature plummeted instantly from searing-hot to freezing cold. Ice crystallized in the air around them, sweeping and curling around itself again and again. Each time it swept through it gathered strength: first it was a chill, then a flurry, and before Wally even had time to react the full force of the blizzard was sweeping their way.
He had no time to throw out a command. All he could do was pull his coat against him and wait for the storm to pass.
Finally, the howling winds receded. Wally shook the frost off his sleeves and eyelashes and surveyed the damage.
The formerly-molten battlefield was now completely solid; there was only frozen rock and puddles of water where lava had once bubbled. Rose lay at his feet, crystals of frost pinning her to the ground. She wasn't badly hurt, but there was no question as to whether she could continue the battle.
“Sorry, Rose,” Wally told her, “that one was my fault.” He leaned down and ran a hand over her petals in silent apology.
She shook her head, brushing away snowflakes with the movement, then chirruped insistently up at him.
“Yeah, we'll keep fighting. Promise.” Wally pressed the button on her poké ball, and with a quick flash of light she disappeared inside it for the second time.
One pokémon left. By all practical considerations, Wally had lost already: even if he beat her swampert, May still had three more fresh pokémon waiting in the wings. He wasn't cocky enough to believe he could take down two-thirds of her team with only a single fighter.
He wasn't disappointed. Quite the opposite, actually. Laughter burbled up in his throat as he wrapped his hand around his single remaining poké ball. This battle was amazing—the only disappointment he felt was in knowing that it would be over at some point.
Fighting May was like a dance. He never wanted it to end.
“This is my last pokémon,” he confessed to her, pitching his voice so she could hear him clearly across the field.
“Oh?” she scowled back at him. “You'd better not be thinking of forfeiting on us.”
“Never,” Wally said, and threw his last poké ball into the air. “Go, Hope!”
His gallade burst forth in an elegant swirl of light, dropping to one knee as he touched the battlefield. When he saw May and Lily standing across from them, the corners of his mouth turned up and he tapped a bladed arm against the ground in a gesture of respect.
“Good to see you, Hope!” May said with a smile. “You ready for this?”
Lily called out her own greeting: a rumbling call that was quieter but no less proud than the roar she'd challenged Wally with before.
Wally's gallade responded by rising to his feet and slipping into a battle stance. It was one he and Wally had practiced together a thousand times before; he felt his heart calm at just the sight of it.
Wally answered for them both. “Not quite yet.”
He closed his eyes and wrapped both hands around his pendant, letting his mind sink into the endless depths of the key stone. The power there was as familiar to him as his own soul, and he drew it out from the pulsing crystal without even a whisper. A mental plea was all it took: please, give my partner strength.
Wally opened his eyes just in time to see the swirling purple light pour from his pendant and wrap around his gallade. Hope arched back as the light swept him up, letting it sink into every crevasse of his being.
The echoes of it pulsed in Wally's heart: power, courage, the need to protect. Everything that made a gallade—his gallade—what it was.
Across the field, an answering beam of light split the air. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the same light wrapping itself around May's swampert, but he couldn't focus on that now. All he had eyes for was his oldest partner. No matter how many times he watched this happen, it still took his breath away.
Finally, after a few seconds and an eternity, the gleaming crystal burst. Hope dropped to the ground with a triumphant cry, his winglike cape sweeping through the air as he turned to face their opponent once more. The blades on his arms had lengthened and gone dark gleaming red around their edges, the sharp fin on his head had gained a sweeping curve… he truly looked like a knight out of one of the stories Wally loved so much as a kid.
Across the field, the swampert had undergone her own transformation. Before, she'd been fearsome enough, but now she radiated sheer power. Her massive arms dwarfed everything around her and her body curved under the weight and the force of her own muscle. Wally doubted even a wrecking ball could so much as budge her from where she stood.
No, he thought with a shiver, and she'd probably rip it apart and eat it for lunch if one tried.
It was May's expression, though, that truly caught his attention. The last trails of purple light still curled around her wrists, casting a strange, otherworldly glow over her whole body. It turned her proud, excited grin into something radiant.
It was perhaps the most beautiful thing Wally had ever seen.
He blushed when she caught his eye, afraid his thoughts might be written across his face, but whatever she saw in his expression only made her smile grow.
“This is the best battle I've had in ages,” she yelled to him across the field. “Wally, you're amazing!”
Amazing.
Wally pushed the compliment down, shoving it deep into his memory to be brought up and blushed over later. Right now, he couldn't afford to focus on anything but the battle.
“You ready?” he asked her.
“I've been ready,” she said, then let her gaze snap to her pokémon. “Lily! Let's start it off the way we finished it!”
The temperature dropped again, but Gallade was healthy and hale and this time Wally had a response.
“Forward!” she called to his gallade. “Close the distance! Don't let her build up an attack!”
Hope darted forward in a flash, dancing around the weak bursts of ice the swampert sent his way. He covered the space between the two in only an instant, then swung his bladed arms down for a punishing blow. Swampert howled at the force of the attack; she brought her massive arms up to cover her face just in time, and the strike landed on insulated muscle rather than delicate fin.
“Don't just block,” May shouted, “counter it! Push him back!”
Lily breathed in deep, then screamed out a challenge; brackish water bubbled up from between the cracks in the tiles to answer her call. It bowled Hope over and pushed him back, striking at his unprotected front at the same time as it threw him bodily away from swampert.
Hope stood after only a moment, shaking the muddy water off with little more than a grimace, but he didn't run back into the fray just yet. Instead he prowled around the edge of the arena, occasionally dancing in and out to test swampert's defenses and gather his own strength.
Wally frowned, deep in thought. He and May knew each other like the back of their hands; each was familiar with their opponent's fighting style.
Wally's gallade was a close-range fighter who liked to slip in with powerful attacks then dart away before his opponent could retaliate. His greatest weakness (one May had taken advantage of more than once) was that he often left himself open while attacking, and he had less skill at taking hits than dishing them out. May's swampert excelled at both short and long-range combat—no surprise, with muscles like those and a near-perfect control over water to match—but she preferred to keep her opponents at a distance when she could. Her defenses were powerful, but she was slow to dodge or block a blow, and Hope would use that weakness to score quick, dancing strikes on her unprotected back whenever he got the chance.
This was a fight he knew already. Not in this room, not in this context, but he knew it all the same. It was the same battle he'd been having since that day in Mauville when he wanted nothing more than to prove to his uncle that he was ready to challenge a gym.
If only his younger self could have known: it wasn't the gym he should have been paying attention to. All along, the woman on the other side of the battlefield had been the most important thing.
Focus on her, then, he told himself. Give her a battle you both can be happy with.
“Okay, Hope.” He swept an arm out, mimicking his pokémon's pose. “Let's test those defenses. Psycho cut!”
Hope darted in and out, back and forth, trying everything he could to swipe at Lily's exposed back. All the while his blades glowed with fierce psychic energy; it amplified the force of each swing, giving even glancing blows the power to draw blood.
May's swampert roared, annoyed, swatting at him with her massive arms as if he were a measly zubat rather than a real opponent. Her water danced around her as she moved, complementing each strike with a sweeping grab aimed towards Hope, but he dodged those as easily as he did the physical attacks.
“Good job!” Wally called. “Keep it up!”
Still, he couldn't help but frown to himself—those light cuts weren't going to be enough to wear down Lily's near-infinite stamina. Right now, Hope was little more than a nuisance to her; he was a threat only because of what he could do, not because of what he was doing.
Wally would need some way to strike a heavier blow if he wanted to win.
“Leaf blade!” Wally called out, but even as he shouted it he knew it wouldn't work—the moment it took for Hope to gather natural energy to coat his blade gave Lily an opening to slam her water against him and send him tumbling backwards.
Hope bounced back to his feet after only a moment, spitting out the foul-tasting water, but Wally could see the his frustration reflected in his pokémon's eyes.
He wanted to order Hope to use swords dance, but there was no safe range for them to try it; close up and he'd get pummeled, far away and he'd get soaked or frozen. The ritual wouldn't work if it were interrupted. His gallade needed that moment of calm to dredge up power from his reserves.
But. But. Wally stared down the length of the battlefield. An idea was coming to him.
May knew he'd be wanting gallade to use swords dance right about now. In battles where they had more space, or where Hope had been offered some cover to hide behind, he'd done just that.
He could follow her expectations. Follow them, then break them, and let her assumptions lead her astray. Wally smiled.
“Hope, to me,” he called out, and a moment later Hope was dodging jets of water to be at his side.
He didn't have long. If he gave them his opponents even a second, Lily would start gathering more water or preparing to unleash another blizzard. Wally spoke quickly, quietly, half in words and half in the hand signals he'd developed over the years spent together with his team.
Listen to what I tell you, he gestured, but watch for what I show you more. Be ready to switch over at a moment's notice.
Gallade blinked in understanding, barely taking his eyes off the battlefield, and the moment Wally nodded he jumped back into the fray. Psychic energy rippled around his blades once more, and he took up the same steady attack pattern.
May watched the battlefield with a small smile and a calm, steady gaze; only the tension in her stance gave a hint to her passion. Every few seconds her eyes would dart back over to Wally—she knew there would be a signal, and she was watching for him to give it.
Well, no reason to keep her waiting.
“Pull back!” he shouted, cutting through the steady sounds of battle with his yell. “Swords dance, now!”
Gallade flickered back a few steps, cape fluttering around him as he moved, and without hesitation dipped into the first step of the familiar dance.
“Blizzard, Lily,” May called out, confidence swelling in her voice.
Ice begin to gather around the swampert once more, cooling the air around them until both humans started to shiver and—Wally watched carefully—the water Lily controlled slowed and turned slushy.
Wally thrust a hand forward, the signal for attack.
Gallade flowed out of the dance just as quickly and gracefully as he'd taken to it. He rose to his feet and sprinted forward, psychic energy quickening his steps until he was more a blur than a solid shape.
“Enough, Lily!” May yelled, realizing her mistake, but the damage was already done; she'd crippled her own water attacks preparing for the strike.
Hope was on her left—
Now her right—
Behind her—
Lily twisted and bent with each of May's frantic commands, but neither of them could possibly be fast enough to keep up with Hope. Wally waited until they were both focused on the same shimmer of air, one where the gallade been only a moment before, then put everything he had into his next command. “Close combat! Now!”
The psychic energy fell away as Wally's gallade landed in front of the swampert. There was no special energy to this move, no trickery or sleight-of-hand: just power, overwhelming and pure, enough to topple even the champion's titanic beast.
Hope raised his blades over his head, ready for the strike—
May shouted, “Substitute!”
Subsitute? Lily hadn't known that move last time they battled!
Wally opened his mouth to warn Hope, to tell him to fall back, but it was too late. His gallade had already committed to the swing, and there was nothing he could do when the overwhelming strike passed through nothing more than a near-transparent fascimile of a pokémon. Gallade let out a shocked cry when his blades sliced through only easily-dispersed energy, and the lack of resistance turned an already unwieldy move into a complete disaster.
Hope was carried to the floor with the force of his own attack, striking his blades hard as he fell. He darted and twisted and turned to rise, but already the real swampert was above him once more.
“Hammer arm,” May commanded, her voice sounding strangely quiet, and Lily countered his gallade's strike with a blow of her own.
This one struck true.
Massive arms slammed into Hope's back and forced him down into the floor. Tile cracked under him with the strength of the blow.
Hope cried out once and then went limp.
Wally's heart stopped in his chest. “Hope!” He dashed forward onto the battlefield, bag knocking against him with every step he took. His mind told him he was being ridiculous—Hope had taken far worse before and risen without a complaint—but his heart whispered what if, what if.
This was his fault. He'd given the wrong command and Hope had been hurt following it.
May caught him as he ran towards his gallade. Her strong arms wrapped around him and pulled him in even as he tried to reach out for Hope.
“He's fine,” she whispered to him, “he's fine, he's fine. Just breathe, okay?”
As Wally watched, Hope shuddered and opened his eyes. He blinked once, wincing, then slowly raised himself up into a sitting position.
“Oh,” Wally said, and crumpled to his knees.
His hands were shaking. He hadn't realized that before. His hands were shaking and his eyes were watering and his lungs were pulling in great heaving gasps of air.
In through his nose, out through his mouth. Count upwards in his head until the numbers felt more real than his trembling body. It had been years since he'd needed to control his breathing this way, but the old exercises came back to him like he'd never stopped.
“Are you okay?” May asked once his breathing had come back down to something close to normal.
Wally opened his eyes to see Hope crouched beside him; he looked a little battered and the cloak of his mega forme had fallen away, but he was very much okay. If anything, he seemed frightened for Wally. Lily crouched behind him, looking about as concerned and guilty as a massive muscle-bound amphibian could.
“I'm fine,” Wally said to all three of them. “I'm sorry. I panicked, that's all. I'm being so silly right now.” He reached out and pressed a hand against his gallade's arm. The smooth, familiar armor was a comfort beyond what any breathing exercise could give him.
May shook her head. “It's different up here. You've come so far, you've thought about it for so long… all your emotions get ramped up. Seriously, don't worry about it.” She rustled through the pack at her side for a moment before pulling out a hyper potion. “Here, use this.”
“I couldn't,” Wally protested. Blubbering all over the champion after a loss was bad enough. Using her supplies for himself was another thing entirely.
“Oh, come on.” May rolled her eyes. “Your pokémon are my friends too, you know. I'll give it to Hope myself if I have to.”
“…All right,” Wally said after a moment. He took the bottle from her hands and sprayed it across the worst of Hope's scrapes. Hope hissed in discomfort as the fine mist hit open skin, but after only a few seconds the cuts started mending together and the bruises began to fade. A little of the knot of tension in Wally's stomach loosened at the sight.
The four of them sat there together for a while, watching each other or the walls or nothing at all—Wally couldn't be quite sure. He just knew he didn't want to be the one to disrupt the silence.
Finally, May nudged him. “You know,” she said, “it took me four tries to get here. First two I didn't even make it up to Steven—Glacia kept knocking me out of the running before I could manage. Each time I lost, I felt totally fine. It just made me want to try again more.”
Wally's cheeks heated up. She'd been such a good sport when she was the challenger, and now that it was his turn he'd lost his composure completely. “I'm sorry,” he said again.
“What? No! That's not what I'm trying to get at.” May shook her head and frowned at him, feigning sternness. “Let me finish my story, okay?” She waited a moment more before continuing. “As I was saying, when I lost it didn't really bother me at all. I thought it would take us at least twenty or thirty tries to win, if we ever did at all. But then, on my fourth try, only my second time getting up to Steven…”
“You beat him.”
“Interrupting again, huh?” May laughed as Wally clapped a hand over his mouth. “But yeah, you're right, I did. It honestly took me completely by surprise—I thought he still had another pokémon to go, but when his metagross finally fainted he didn't replace it with anything. He just stood there and said, “Congratulations, Champion,” and I…”
May cut herself off, mouth snapping closed. Swampert's voice rumbled in what sounded like laughter.
“You what?” Wally asked. He was completely consumed by the story—he'd drawn closer to her without even realizing it. Hope, too, was hanging on every word.
“I started crying,” May admitted with a blush. “Just bawling. I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed, and no matter what Steven tried to say to me I couldn't make myself stop. It was awful.”
Wally tried to hide his laughter behind the sleeves of his coat, but there was no disguising it; the thought of May, victorious, crumpled on the ground and wailing like a woman in mourning was simply too much to imagine. “You really did? Why? What happened?”
“It was like… I'd spent all my time thinking about how to beat him. Every waking moment of my life I was dreaming of it—every sleeping moment too—and then all of a sudden the title was mine. I didn't know what to do next.” She shrugged. “After a while I stopped sniffling and picked myself up, and Steven led me through the Hall of Fame while pretending he wasn't completely horrified by the thought of me as champion.”
“You do a great job,” Wally said stubbornly. “If he doesn't realize it, that's his fault.”
“You are the sweetest person I know, you know that?”
“I—” Wally stammered. “I, um. Thank you.” Somehow, he always ended up bright red when he was around her.
“Steven's a good guy, though,” May added, a bit more seriously, “it's not like he was really against me or anything. He knows I'm good at taking care of things most of the time.” She shuffled closer to him until his knee was pressed against hers. “I just wanted you to know that your reaction doesn't even come close to the worst this arena has seen. It's normal.”
May had stopped to comfort him when his pokémon was injured, she'd lent him her own potions to heal his team, she'd told an embarrassing story to make him feel better… Wally had thought, coming in, that the May he would face in this room would be different than the girl he'd always known; she'd be more terrifying, more ferocious, more… something. As it turned out, though, the only thing she was was more competent—underneath it all, she was still the same friend he'd known since he was little.
Wally caught her eye. “Thank you. Not just for the story. For everything.”
May laughed, that familiar joy lighting up her face. “Of course! I didn't want you to not come back. I like battling you too much.”
Hope made a proud little noise at her praise. Lily snorted in response, as if to say don't get cocky.
“So, what happens next?” Wally didn't really care for the thought of walking back down all those stairs.
“Well, normally I'd press a button”—May tapped at something on her belt, and with a creaking of stone (and an astonished gasp from Wally) a staircase unfolded from the edge of the platform and began to extend towards a hidden doorway in one of the faraway walls—“and send you on your way. There's an elevator back down to the Pokémon Center through that door.”
May stretched and stood, arching her back up towards the stone ceiling, before turning towards Wally to offer him a hand up. He took it gratefully—his feet still felt a little unsteady.
“That said,” she continued, “it's an awfully boring walk, and all I've got to look forward to is some awfully boring paperwork if I stay up here.” Her smile was shier than he'd ever seen it before. “Perhaps you'd like some company on the way down? We could get lunch, and you could fill me in on all the exciting things you've been doing while skipping out on the Battle Maison and leaving me to fight people alone.”
Most of what Wally had been doing centered around panicking about the Pokémon League, packing for the Pokémon League, or panicking about packing for the Pokémon League. Nevertheless, he grinned at the offer.
“I'd like that a lot.” Just the chance to spend a little more time around her would be reward enough on its own.
He could tell her some stories about his time on Victory Road, maybe. Perhaps he'd explain how he'd managed to get himself hemmed in by boulders while trying to make a path and had to spend the next three hours waiting for Star to dig him a way out. Knowing May, she'd probably have a tale to match it.
May smiled at him and gestured towards the staircase. It wasn't the one he'd hoped to climb today—he gave a last lingering glance towards the doors that marked the Hall of Fame—but as far as consolation prizes went he was more than happy with his.
“Thank you for a wonderful battle,” May said as he passed her. Her voice was serious once more, the way it had been when she first challenged him. Wally knew instinctively that it was the champion he was speaking to now.
He turned to face her and—without thought, because thinking would give him enough time to be embarrassed about what he was going to do—he swept an arm out and bowed before her, then leaned in pressed a chaste kiss to the knuckles of her left hand.
It was a move Hope had taught him, back when he was a newly-evolved gallade and wally was a clumsy child, and it was the bow of a knight to the ruler he served. Fealty, respect, love… all of those things he gathered up and wove into the gesture. All he could do was hope she understood the meaning of it.
May had been his second-ever friend, behind only Hope. Of all the people he'd met on his journey, she was still (and always would be) the most precious. May was the yardstick he measured himself to and the distant horizon he was always running to catch up with.
And, above all else, she was the person he trusted the most. He challenged her not because he wanted to defeat her—though he did, of course he did—but for the sheer joy of battling with her. There was no one else who could make him feel so alive.
For a moment, May stood frozen. Wally stood again, suddenly nervous, unsure what to say and afraid to break the stillness in the air. Lily and Hope both hung back: each waited on their trainer's cue to respond.
Then, May laughed. She took a hopping step towards him and pressed a soft kiss of her own against his forehead, just below the fringe of his bangs. “Honestly. Did it have to take you this long?”
“Ah,” Wally stammered out, suddenly shy, and the blush only crawled further up his face when she reached out and twined their fingers together.
“Come on, then,” she said, and she was pulling him down the stairs and towards the elevator. “Lunch can be my treat, but I'll make you pay next time around!”
Behind him, Wally was pretty sure he could hear both Hope and Lily laughing, high and low voices pitched together in a strange cacophony. Laughing at us, he thought, but he couldn't bring himself to feel too put-out about it. Not when May's hand was still a solid warmth in his own.
The four of them made their way out of the arena together, towards sunlight and the promise of food.